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21 Jan 2008 : Column 1508W—continued
Transport: Coventry
Mr. Greg Knight: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what grants her Department has provided for transport infrastructure in Coventry in the last 12 months; and what future such grants are planned to be made. [180277]
Ms Rosie Winterton: The Department has provided local transport capital allocations for Coventry city council and the West Midlands Passenger Transport Authority for 2007-08 and has announced funding for 2008-09 to 2010-11, as shown in the following table.
The seven West Midlands metropolitan district councils and the PTA are free to redistribute most of their funding allocations among themselves if they so decide.
| £ million | ||||
| 2007-08 | 2008-09 | 2009-10 | 2010-11 | |
A grant of £2.043 million has been allocated for 2008-09 to capital maintenance on the detrunked sections of the A45 in Coventry. About 18 per cent. of the specific road safety grant which totals between £4.4 million and £4.7 million per year between 2007-08 and 2010-11 across the West Midlands metropolitan area is for capital projects, that is for transport infrastructure.
Additionally, the West Midlands urban traffic control system major scheme bid is currently being considered by the Department. The bid is still subject to final confirmation and approval, but should it be successful, a total of £26.6 million would be awarded covering the West Midlands Authorities.
£64.3 million of private finance initiative credits for the 25 year Coventry street lighting project have been announced.
In addition Coventry is benefiting from investment in strategic transport infrastructure including the west coast main line.
Women and Equality
Departmental Data Protection
Mrs. Villiers: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality whether personal data for which the Government Equality Office are responsible are (a) stored and (b) processed overseas; and if she will make a statement. [176009]
Barbara Follett: The Government Equalities Office does not store or process any personal data overseas.
Discrimination
John McDonnell: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality what responsibility (a) she and (b) Ministers in other Departments have for policy on (i) racial, (ii) religious, (iii) disability and (iv) age discrimination. [174782]
Barbara Follett [holding answer 17 December 2007]: I refer my hon. Friend to the written ministerial statement made by my hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office on 18 October 2007:
Government Equalities Office
Philip Davies: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality how much has been spent by the Government Equalities Office (a) in total and (b) on staff costs on promoting equality and diversity since it was established; and how many people are employed by the Office for this purpose. [173819]
Barbara Follett: The formation of the Government Equalities Office was announced on 26 July this year. In the 2007-08 financial year it, and its predecessor organisation, have spent £51.54 million in total to date.
Of this amount, £48.63 million was used to fund the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the Women's National Commission and the former Commissions for Racial Equality and Equal Opportunity.
As all of the work that the GEO does is concerned with promoting equality and diversity, all 61 of its permanent staff and six temporary staff are employed for this purpose.
In the 2007-08 financial year the GEO staff costs amounted to £1.94 million from 1 April to 30 November. This figure excludes staff costs paid by the commissions aforementioned.
The GEO currently has 61 permanent staff and six temporary staff in post. This excludes Private Office and the costs of legal staff working alongside the Office.
Figures are rounded to the nearest £10,000. Full-year figures are included as normal accounting conventions require them to be accounted for on a full-year basis.
Polygamy
Mrs. May: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality what estimate she has made of the number of recognised legal polygamous marriages in the United Kingdom. [174511]
Barbara Follett: A formal estimate has not been made although it is generally thought there are fewer than 1,000 legally recognised polygamous marriages within the UK.
Single Equalities Bill
Mr. Harper: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality when she expects to publish a draft of the Single Equalities Bill; and if she will make a statement. [179349]
Barbara Follett [holding answer 15 January 2008]: The Government have given a manifesto commitment to introduce a new Equality Act during the lifetime of this Parliament.
Prime Minister
Members: Correspondence
Mr. Soames: To ask the Prime Minister when he expects to reply to the letters from the hon. Member for Mid Sussex on 26 September 2007 and on 13 November 2007 about Lord Kinnock; and what the reason is for the time taken in replying. [180620]
The Prime Minister: My right hon. and noble Friend Lord Kinnock continues to be an excellent chairman of the British Council. Speeches made at the Labour Party conference are not a matter for the Government.
Northern Ireland
Departmental Databases
Mrs. Villiers: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what audits his Department and its agencies have carried out in relation to personal data and IT equipment in each of the last 10 years. [176489]
Mr. Woodward: The Northern Ireland Office has not performed any auditing of personal data in the last 10 years. In each of the last 10 years, my Department has maintained an asset register of IT equipment.
Internal Audit has not carried out specific audits of IT equipment. It has carried out the following audits of asset management which includes IT equipment within the scope.
NI Prison Service asset management audits in 2002-03 and in 2006-07
NIO core Department, an asset management audit was carried out in 2000-01
Audit logs of the following actions are maintained on our accredited systems.
System File access
Printing
Internet Access
User Accounts
These audit logs are monitored on a weekly basis. However, this is one of the areas that will be investigated during the 2(nd) phase of the data handling procedures in Government review.
Departmental Pay
Sarah Teather: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland pursuant to the answer of 27 November 2007, Official Report, column 288W, on departmental pay, how many of those earning over £100,000 were employed (a) as special advisers and (b) in a political role in each year since 1997. [177182]
Mr. Woodward: Since 2003, the Government have published on an annual basis the number of special advisers in each pay band. For the most recent information, I refer the hon. Member to the statement made by my right hon. Friend, the Prime Minister on 22 November 2007, Official Report, columns 147-51WS.
Information on the number and cost of special advisers prior to 2003 was provided at regular intervals and this information will be available in the Library of the House.
Missing Persons
Mr. Dodds: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many persons are registered as missing in Northern Ireland, broken down by (a) age, (b) sex and (c) religion. [168540]
Paul Goggins: 68 persons were registered as missing in Northern Ireland as of early November 2007. Only a very small number of persons reported missing are not subsequently located.
Missing persons are dealt with at district level and the breakdown by age, sex and religion requested could not be provided without conducting a full examination of the records of each district, which could be carried out only at disproportionate cost.
Rape
Mr. Dodds: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many recorded rapes there were in Northern Ireland in each of the last 10 years, and what percentage of those recorded rapes led to a conviction in each of those years, broken down by Police Service of Northern Ireland District Command Units. [174857]
Paul Goggins: The Government is committed to improving the rates of successful prosecution in rape cases. Specialist police units, staffed by highly skilled and trained personnel, are dedicated to enhancing the service to victims of rape and sexual assault and both PSNI and the Public Prosecution Service are seeking to develop models of best investigative practice so that more offences can achieve the threshold for prosecution.
The Northern Ireland Office and the Department of Health and Social and Personal Services have also jointly developed, and consulted on, a draft regional strategy for addressing sexual violence in Northern Ireland which will address these issues through a robust action plan delivering on strategic objectives in three key areas—crime prevention, better victim support and improved protection and justice measures. The strategy is to be published this spring.
Table 1 shows the number of rapes (including attempts) recorded by PSNI from 2001-02 to 2006-07 by DCU. As the DCU structure was only introduced in 2001-02, it is not possible to provide a breakdown by DCU prior to this year.
Table 2 shows the number of prosecutions, convictions and percentage conviction rate for rape by District Command Unit from 2000 to 2005 (the years for which figures are available).
Data are collated on the basis of the principal offence; so only the most serious offence with which an offender is charged is included.
It is not possible routinely to reconcile recorded crime data from PSNI with prosecution and conviction data. Data from PSNI relate to the number of offences, whereas data on prosecutions and convictions relate to the number of offenders brought before the courts. In addition, PSNI data denote each offence as it has been initially recorded, and this may differ from the offence for which a suspect or suspects are subsequently proceeded against in the courts. I therefore regret that a direct comparison between recorded rape and convictions for rape cannot easily be made.
| Table 1: Number of rapes (including attempts) recorded by PSNI from 2001-02 to 2006-07 by District Command Unit | ||||||
| District Command Unit | Recorded 2001-02 | Recorded 2002-03 | Recorded 2003-04 | Recorded 2004-05 | Recorded 2005-06 | Recorded 2006-07 |
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